Fireside Chat Transcript 21 Mar 2k20

[silence]
What kind of coffee do I drink?
Well, actually, just at the moment, Folgers.
Black Silk.
Like, I, uh...
I used to make the joke that I like my coffee like I like my women, hot and bitter.
But then I realized that I really needed to change my dating habit.
[laughs]
Basically, I, uh, my...
I was raised on doctor-strength coffee, and then I became a lawyer,
which means that it's pretty much the kind of thing that you could degrease an engine with.
And, uh, yeah.
I don't drink it for the taste.
I drink it in order to be awake, because I love some stimulants.
[silence]
But yeah, I don't really have a whole coffee snob kind of thing going on.
I don't have time for that.
I just don't give a shit enough about it to really dive into what kind of coffee is good and what kind is bad.
It just needs to be strong and work.
[silence]
Which is not to say that I have nothing wrong with coffee snobs.
Like, they want to give me coffee that they have spent the time and effort to say it is good and all this stuff.
But I have a friend who's really into this.
Sorry, this is a banjo.
I have a friend that's really into that stuff, and, like, they grind the beans in a fancy way,
and it just takes a lot more time than just heaping piles of ground coffee in something
and making a concentrated shot of as thermonuclear-strength possible as I can.
[silence]
Nibble our fuel scene.
All right, enough about coffee.
So I want to talk first and foremost about probably the biggest opportunity we have for Capital Fight is tomorrow.
We're going to do a locust fleet, and we're going to be doing it in the Fountain region.
And we anticipate that there will be some attempt to fuck with that locust fleet.
So that means that I want people -- this is why I'm putting this at the start of the fireside --
I want people to be there and ready for -- not just with their Roarquals, but with their Super Capitals, lots.
Basically, we are operating under the assumption that we are going to get attacked tomorrow in the locust fleet
and that we want to turn up for it.
We know that Fountain has been getting scouted recently, and it's just an easy target if we don't take it seriously.
As we know, because we got our asses kicked because we didn't take locust fleet seriously enough.
And so we are adapting, and we are continuing to adapt.
So please turn up with your Roarqual and also with your Super Capitals.
[silence]
So we are going to -- you'll see broadcasts for that tomorrow at the usual time.
I would say the usual time, but because of daylight savings time, normally they're like 1700-1800,
but who even fucking knows, if one of my people can say that, that would be good.
[silence]
Okay. A couple of other things to go through here.
[silence]
CCP has a contest that has absolutely nothing to do with us or what we like or what we care about.
And it's the Kings of Losec competition.
And if somebody can do me a favor here and drop the dev blog for the Kings of Losec nonsense into Elysium.
[silence]
The reason why this is funny is that it's exactly the kind of thing that we can fuck with,
and we'll fuck with because we're bored and we might as well,
and it's going to be hilarious and it's going to make a lot of people cry.
Thank you, horrendous.
So go ahead and take a look at that.
And the reason I'm putting this in front of everybody is this is something that's going to start 6th,
and it basically involves whichever alliance get the most amount of damage done in terms of final blows,
will get in Losec during this period of time,
will get credit for being the "Kings of Losec", which is a credential that I do not give a flying fuck about,
because who cares about being the King of Losec,
except that there's a lot of basically little bitches that care very deeply about being the Kings of Losec,
and I think it would be really funny and give us something amusing to do,
to relentlessly fuck with all their hopes and dreams by making ourselves the Kings of Losec,
or at the very least, coming way ahead of other entities that actually live in Losec and give a shit about it.
So the reason I'm putting this out there is we have a hive mind collectively,
and we're full of very clever, hilarious people that love taking systems and breaking them,
and so the Directorate, we were talking about this earlier, and coming up with stuff,
you guys collectively are going to come up with ways to manipulate and fuck with the system
in ways that just the Directorate will not be able to.
So I put that to all of our genius assholes here to put our heads together between now and the 26th,
and just scheme and come up with ways for us to become the Kings of Losec.
Apparently the reward--again, this is penis-sized stuff.
My dick does not gain inches or lose inches because of the size of kill boards or anything like that,
but for a lot of people, they care very deeply about the idea of having their alliance flag flying over the CCP headquarters for a month,
and we know this because PL made a big deal about being the Kings of Losec back in the day or some crap like that.
So we just think it would be really fun, so let's fuck with them.
So again, let's just kind of think about putting your heads together.
It might end up being a GS-ISC thing because there might be a way to optimize the system to manipulate the way in which things are destroyed,
or we might end up having thunder domes and God only knows what,
but we have between now and the 26th to come up with a whole bunch of evil plans and then a few days to implement them,
and we can do this close to home because we can just pop over into Aridia on our front doorstep and, heh.
So yeah, we have absolutely discussed thunder domes, but I want people not only thinking about the obvious things, which are thunder domes,
but do your crazy genius thing of finding a way to optimize this shit and break the hell out of it.
I have absolute confidence in our collective ability to do that.
You can talk about that here in Elysium, Isolali, good question.
And basically, if people discuss it in multiple channels over the course of several days, ideas will come out and people will figure shit out.
Okay.
So a couple of other things that are going on.
We are looking at reviewing our doctrines.
We have a bit of a doctrine bloat scenario.
We've come back to F deployment, we tested out a couple of really cool doctrines there,
and the fitting team is working with our fleet commanders and generally putting their heads together now with our data people to do something that I'm quite excited about,
attempting to basically use data tracking to determine engagement level with the main ships of the line in any given doctrine over time.
We'll see where that goes. That's like a uptime-ish project.
But basically, we're going to be making some doctrine changes, and one of those things that you guys can look forward to that's coming is we're going to be looking at a formal Kikimora doctrine, which should be fun.
And on top of that, Pathfinders are going to be -- Kathy Aaron asked me to talk about this, such that he doesn't have to repeat himself too much at the upcoming Pathfinders meeting.
But Pathfinders are going to be actively looking into ways of diving into drifter holes and using those for us to ram Kikimoras all around the galaxy for funsy.
So Pathfinders are going to be looking at ways to regularly be sussing out drifter holes, and then we're going to fuck around with the entire galaxy, not just with the King's Lowsect shit, but also Kikimoras everywhere.
So we don't yet have a formal posting of the doctrine. Pathfinders were just informed of this right now.
But as you guys can see, we are all preparing for months of lockdown and coming up with cool shit to do, and this is part of the cool shit to do.
So, drifter holes for Pathfinders, doctrine reform, and Kikis on the horizon.
And unfortunately, when it comes to any questions about how the drifter hole shit works or any of that, I am completely clueless.
As usual, I am a simple mitten.
Speaking of being a simple mitten, let me take a look at this straw hole.
All right.
Let's see what else we got.
You don't have to worry about Kikimora fits or anything like that. There is going to be a doctrine which will be handed to you by the fitting team when we announce the doctrine, as usual, the state provides.
So there's one other thing I want to say in terms of action items before we just go to questions and answers, which is virus related, which is basically a simple survival technique.
As things get bad, depending on your locality, like in some countries, people are going to be fine. In other countries, things might get really bad.
If you are in a scenario where you're dealing with a viral surge, i.e. your healthcare system is overloaded, it is very tempting in lockdown for people, particularly if you are turbo nerds like us.
We're all here talking about EVE Online, so we're all nerds.
It's very easy to get into sweatpants and not shaving mode.
Right?
Anybody think, hey, I'm trapped inside.
It's like, I don't really need to get gussied up or really take care of my appearance or anything.
I want to try to encourage people to not only take care of their appearance and take care of their hygiene, because it's good for your mental health, which it is.
Like, okay, sure.
Looking good helps you feel good.
It's good for mental health.
But, you know, forget the nice, happy, fun feelings stuff.
There is a tactical reason why you want to maintain your appearance, which is this.
If there is a healthcare system which is overloaded and you have to go to the hospital and thus you are in a triage scenario and an overloaded healthcare scenario -- and all the military guys know what I'm talking about here with this.
But if you don't understand triage, that means basically you go to an overloaded hospital, you are unable to take care of yourself because shit is fucked, and a nurse or a doctor is going to basically choose whether you live or die.
You will have an advantage if you are well-groomed, if you are well-dressed, and if you look as good as possible.
This does not necessarily mean getting done up like your fucking supermodel every day, but you do not want to turn into a disgusting sack of shit, because if you end up in a triage scenario, you are more likely to survive and be better off.
Again, it's an emotional thing.
It might not make the difference, but every advantage you have helps.
So keep your shit together, not just because you'll feel better, but because it will increase your survival chances in an overload scenario.
All right, so with that out of the way, we are going to take questions and answers.
I'm going to cut questions and answers a little bit short this time.
This has been a briefer fireside.
We do have a lot of cool things going on in the background.
We've got a couple projects.
Again, I talked about this last week.
We've got a nifty project, not the King's LOSAC thing, but that is in progress, and we're getting there, so we're not going to announce it yet, but hopefully next week.
We have a lot of things for you guys to do in EVE Online while we're all dealing with a pandemic.
But the reason I would be keeping the fireside relatively short today is that on the meta show today, we have two guests from CCP.
That is going to be CCB Rise and CCB Signal, and so I will be setting up the little space studio or whatever the fuck you call it here to do that today.
So that'll be on the meta show in 36 minutes.
So now Q&As.
Pants continue to be optional, though, yes.
Pants are optional.
What I would suggest is that you have nice pants around such that if you get sick and you're about to go to the hospital, then you put your pants on, and, you know, the rest of you is well-groomed and stuff.
You put your pants on, and then you go.
What will I be wearing?
Well, you'll get to see that on the meta show.
I've actually upgraded my fan today because I took my -- I keep messing around with it because I might as well, and I have a little vest on in addition to the suit I'm experimenting with.
The Jeff redeployment.
Future plans question, but it's a reasonable one.
So the reason why we don't immediately redeploy the Jeff once we take them home, and this goes for all war deployments, but I'm going to explain this because we have new people in the Alliance and Coalition.
This is a question from Dermotoshiro, which is basically when we do deploy, usually the content providers or personnel or whatever you want to call them, the command and control layer, are the ones that are doing a tremendous amount of work.
And the job of the command and control layer is to make deployments as fun and as easy as possible for the line members, right?
So basically in any given fleet, you have recon people working, you've got logistics people working, you've got spies working, you've got cord working, you've got, like, the boss fleet commanders, you've got directors running around like maniacs.
And we burn the candle at both ends for these deployments, and that's why typically EVE deployments last for at most a month to a month and a half.
And then after that, you have to, like, rest and recharge.
And the reason why I'm explaining this is that in many cases, we have scenarios here where if we in the directorate are doing our jobs correctly, you guys in the line are still fully recharged and ready to fight and ready to go no matter what.
And that's important because you never want to burn out your line members because then you can't go on defense if we get attacked.
So when we go deploying, often we're speaking of the command layer is burning the candle at both ends and working like maniacs to make sure that it's easy as possible for you guys to fight.
And then when we come home, people are like, "Hey, when are we going to go out again?"
Because if we've done our jobs right, you guys are still full of them and vigor, and like you want to go out and do stuff.
So that's why we're not immediately, like, redeploying the Jeff.
We just got them back home.
We need to let our command and control people recharge.
We have various other projects that we're working on.
So I wouldn't anticipate another Jeff deployment for at least until mid-April.
I'm not going to commit to a date certain, obviously.
Do you think that CCB have changed any marketing or game development strategies because of the pandemic?
I haven't really looked.
That's a good question, Ronald and Mackenza.
I haven't really looked because what CCB is doing relating to the pandemic is like the last of my pandemic-related concerns.
I actually have seen a promotional email from World of Tanks offering like two weeks of free premium time.
So I wouldn't be surprised if you see the games industry sort of step into this.
And, you know, obviously it's a great time for people to stay inside and play computer games.
What are my comments about my country's reaction to the virus?
If you want to hear my comments about what I think about politically and stuff like that, you can follow my fucking Twitter account.
Needless to say, it's not very good.
But the nice thing is, is that the states, certain states are actually starting to step into the breach and handle things.
So I think it's going to be dealt with on a state by state basis within the United States.
What is my podcast coming up?
Well, Graf got sick.
I don't think he got the big bug, but he was down and out for a couple of weeks with a very serious influenza.
And that kind of that and the fact that the pandemic really sort of became obvious to everybody else has kind of delayed my plans there.
I do still want to do a podcast.
I've gone through all this effort to start doing that.
But then, you know, pandemic.
As things calm down collectively, we're going to be playing more computer games and we will be doing a lot of more like podcast indoorsy type activities.
So don't worry, it's not something that has been abandoned.
Graf is like back and live.
I mean, he's not dead from the flu or anything.
I don't know if he's actually playing Eve or anything.
Do I have enough toilet paper?
Yeah, guys, I if you remember correctly, I was the one who was getting told that I was crazy and overblowing everything like a month before everybody else.
So like I have been in my little bunker for actually, I think, a full three weeks now.
So I'm good.
On the other hand, for me, also, I'm a turbo nerd.
So throw me in the briar patch where all I do is, you know, play video games and talk to my friends online and pretty much just do everything else that I would normally do, except that now nobody can shame me about staying indoors and just doing all the shit I want to do.
Anyway, when I still eat Home Chef, Blue Apron, HelloFresh, all this is a separate food source.
I actually currently have HelloFresh going.
I like HelloFresh a lot.
You know, when I receive a box, I take it to my quarantine zone and I am very careful about not eating it.
But like if you wash your food and you heat your food, you know, cooking food kills bad stuff.
Doesn't matter what kind of virus it is, doesn't matter if it's bacteria.
If you cook it, you're in good shape.
So do that.
How do I feel about economics and politics working in reality?
The war and destruction aside, more to the broadcast for us, the positive community, how easer, greater, and sure to good light.
Well that's a very good and deep question, Shadow Asuna.
And the answer is way too long.
I mean, if you want to know what I think about how Eve things work with reality, I wrote a piece called Masks in Cyber Purgatory a couple years ago at length,
talking about the way that people interact with Eve and interact with their identities in the real world.
What do I think of Doom Eternal?
I don't think of Doom Eternal.
I didn't play the last Doom either.
It apparently was very well reviewed, but I played the original Doom and the whole early days FPS thing isn't really my thing.
People are giving each other binge suggestions as far as things to watch.
I highly recommend something that a friend of mine, Tim Maly, or Mally, I don't know how to pronounce his last name actually,
recommended the other day, which is James Burke's 1978 history of science series called Connections.
It's 10 episodes. It's a fascinating thing about how invention progresses, not in a linear way or chronological way, but it's just fascinating stuff and it's very calming.
So I highly recommend if you're looking for something to binge, History of Science, Connections, James Burke. It's all on YouTube.
Do I see any similarities between the virus and the corrupted blood incident from World of Warcraft?
I mean, yes, from a certain perspective, because, and this is the thing that I've been saying for it feels like months now, but I guess it's only been like a month and a half or whatever,
is the way that a virus propagates is a very simple mathematical, it's not a simple equation, but it's simple enough that it can be predicted mathematically.
And we have already seen this, that epidemiologically speaking, models are able to accurately predict already when the rubber hits the road, how these things work.
This is the reason why, but the public can't handle the real math because they want to enjoy denial.
So you're finding, now finally you're starting to see government say 80% of the human species will be infected because that's how a novel virus works.
And that we will probably be in this shit for 18 months to 24 months in terms of the period of lockdowns and unlockdowns.
But the reason why the model, the math comes out later is because people don't want to stare into the abyss and confront what's happening.
And people, the thing is this guys, I'm going to cut this off here in a moment because I need to get ready for the meta show.
But I've realized that my perceptions of humans in the real world are very biased because when I think of stupid people, my baseline for human stupidity is the dumbest EVE Online players.
Most of the time when I hang out with people in the real world, they are people who are on my intellectual level.
And the people that I associate with in EVE Online tend to be ideally the smarter people in EVE Online, particularly those that I promote and the people that are in the Imperium.
And my baseline for skull fucking human stupidity is what I'm exposed to on a regular basis is dumb EVE players doing dumb things.
And what has been absolutely horrifying to me to stare into the abyss during this whole virus process is to realize that the dumbest fucking EVE Online player turns out to be a fucking super genius compared to the actual stupid people out there that cannot get to a level of even figuring out how to play EVE.
And the fact that that is even possible is sort of horrifying.
So anyway, whatever.
Anyway, boys and girls, the main thing is, is that look out for each other.
One of the advantages that we have as an organization going through this pandemic is the fact that we have essentially a global intelligence network that we can share information with one another as things go.
Again, virus denialism or misinformation is the kind of, well, we don't shoot you for misinformation.
People are sharing data.
If we catch people maliciously trying to say it's just a flu, we'll shoot you.
We actually haven't had to do that, though, because it's obviously not just a flu.
But virus denialism is still bad.
Look out for each other, and we will get through this thing.
I think that we are going to be better equipped.
If you're a member of the Imperium, you are going to be better equipped.
And EVE players in general are going to be better equipped to deal with this simply because we are already used to spending a lot of time online and amusing ourselves.
So there you go.
[no audio]
Yes, virus denialism did get taken out back and shot by reality now, so it's kind of nice.
[no audio]
We're not going to do anything involving like a subforum relating to the pandemic.
I don't think that's necessary yet.
People can just share information in Elysium.
That's been working out fine so far.
We don't really want to build new systems and new complexities unless there is a need for new systems or new complexities.
[no audio]
Good question from TheMillenia.
"Referencing bloat and R doctrines, are we planning to drop some older, less used doctor ships?"
Yes, absolutely.
That's for people who have not really been part of the Imperium.
When we do doctrine reform, this is what happens is the fitting team gets together with the fleet commanders and has a big discussion about what's actually getting used, what's good, what the fleet commanders like, and we cut back on the stuff that is not getting used.
[no audio]
And this is also a thing that typically happens after a deployment.
So like in this case, we just deployed the Jeff, and we had a lot of fun with our Typhoons, and we had a lot of fun with our Sackvillages, and now we're coming back and comparing notes and going, "Hey, like, kikis, hey, what should we drop?"
You know, that kind of thing.
So expect changes ahead.
[no audio]
"Are there contingency plans in place for the fact that our fearless leaders get sick and are unable to administer the horde of spacemen?"
[no audio]
Yes. Like, the system has repeatedly worked with me going offline for periods of time.
So don't worry about that.
[no audio]
I also locked myself in my bunker three weeks ago, so my intention is to not get it if I can avoid it.
Again, the game has two rules, guys.
Rule number one is avoid getting sick for as long as possible.
And rule number two is when you do get sick, try to not give it to anybody else.
Very simple.
[no audio]
I keep saying "bunker." Do I actually have one? I will--no comment on that.
[no audio]
I mean, there's two ways that goes.
If I don't have a bunker, I would no comment it such that people think I have a bunker and look in the wrong place.
And if I do have a bunker, I'd no comment it anyway, because you would never confirm or deny that you had a bunker.
[no audio]
This is not the first time, though.
Amusingly enough, that I've had give firesides from undisclosed locations during my little love-to-club midlife crisis.
I was moving around a lot, if you guys remember.
[no audio]
All right, boys and girls.
I think that's going to be it for today in terms of Q&As and stuff.
Most of it is virus-related, and that's cool, or related to wartime deployments.
Again, we're going to be messing around with the champions of LowSec.
And what I want to leave you with here before I go set up the whole meta show thing--
again, we're going to have CCB Rise and CCB Signal with Brisk and I, and that will be starting in 20 minutes.
Is the Locust Fleet tomorrow. We expect it to be attacked, so I want supercapitals, I want titans, and the rorquals.
We want to take it seriously, because if we're going to get dropped on, we want to skullfuck the people who are trying to drop on us.
[no audio]
Erendis, exactly. That's correct.
[no audio]
Requests about doctrines. I'm not going to speak about future doctrines that we are looking at, except for the Kikis.
Like I said, we're going to be doing a Kiki doctrine of some kind, most likely.
Like, 99% odds there.
But, like, we're going through and cutting docks out, as opposed to adding too many new ones in.
[no audio]
Alright, boys and girls. Thank you for coming. Stay safe, look out for each other, and we will meet here again next week, same time.
Locust Fleet tomorrow, bring your toys, and start thinking about ways to ratfuck the Kings of Losec competition in a way that will make the people that really do care about being the Kings of Losec extremely angry.
Thank you. I'll see you next week.